Adaptive shared control of a smart wheelchair operated by voice control

The NavChair Assistive Wheelchair Navigation System is being developed to reduce the cognitive and physical requirements of operating a power wheelchair. The NavChair is an adaptive shared control system, shared in that control is divided between the wheelchair and the wheelchair operator and adaptive in that how control is divided between the wheelchair and the wheelchair operator varies based on current task requirements. This paper describes the NavChair´s method for automatically allocating control between the wheelchair and its operator and presents results evaluating the performance of the NavChair´s automatic adaptation mechanism from an experiment in which able-bodied subjects used voice control to steer the NavChair through a navigation task requiring several transitions between operating modes